The Brightspark Blog

We are very excited by the opportunity to invest into Salesfloor: It fits really well with our investment focus – huge market potential, a very knowledgeable and experienced founder/ CEO, a unique technology solving a real market opportunity and solid …

Since the coverage we received in Techvibes, it appears that the “floodgates have been opened” and we are seeing lots and lots of dealflow. And frankly, the quality of dealflow is quite impressive. As the Techvibes article explained, Brightspark is …

It’s almost 15 years now that I have been a Venture Capital investor in Canada. I started off as a software developer in the 80’s (actually, I started off wanting to live in a socialist utopia on a Kibbutz, but …

So, when do you panic? As an investor in many startups, we are always dealing with a major crisis in one of our companies. The reality of startups is that it is actually part of the normal process to have …

Normally this is the time of the year that really stresses me out. It is late September in Ontario, summer is over, the leaves are starting to change colour, and while it is still pretty nice out, it’s real clear …

We want to see lots of deals, but the challenge is to meet expectations. Given the volume of deals that we see on a weekly basis, we consistently need to be selective in determining which deals we will pursue and …

The press in Canada has been full of articles about how Bill Gates thinks that if Canada and the US want to stay ahead, they should “focus on improving the quality of education and expanding the number of young people …

This week, we had a reunion in Toronto for the company that I co-founded in the 80s/90s called Delrina. (For some history, see wikipedia). Amazingly, close to 200 ex-Delrina employees attended (see photos here at Flickr), but more amazingly this …

I am on a plane to Vancouver heading for the CVCA annual conference. (No wireless access to e-mails with Air Canada so got lots of time on my hands). For those of you not familiar with the Canadian venture capital …

Last weekend, my daughter, 7 years old, had to prepare an interview with one of her parents about their job. She chose me, lucky her – I am a venture capitalist. Explaining what a venture capitalist does to most people …

A few weeks ago, I walked out of a pitch meeting with an entrepreneur and the only thing I could think about was how to close this deal quickly and make sure that I scooped it from the competition. These …